Children on Skid Row

I see more and more children on Skid Row today.

A few years ago, it wasn’t like that.

Now I see mothers pushing strollers.

I see young teens on their way to school.

Is it a good thing, or a bad thing?

One part of me is glad to see the missions ...

Open their doors to homeless mothers with children.

Another part of me is heart broken.

The Row is no place for a child.

You talk about the jungle,

Well this is the jungle's jungle of thieves,

Murderers, winos, junkies, child molesters.

Jackals hunting in packs or single lions on the prowl.

Fearless and without mercy.

Men and women who are on psych meds.

Mentally ill people.

All living down here.

Some of them don’t even know what day it is.

What do they care about a child?

They don’t even care about themselves.

The voices that tell them to step in front of a truck ...

Could very easily tell them to attack an innocent child.

It’s a good. It’s a bad thing.

It’s life on the Row.

© 2006, Ollie Buchanan,

aka Skid Row Poet